Jehovah-jireh. — That is, Jehovah will provide. In Genesis 22:8, Abraham had said “Elohim-jireh,” God will provide. He now uses Jehovah as the equivalent of Elohim. It is added that hence arose a proverb “In the mount of the Lord it shall be seen,” or rather, In the mount of Jehovah it shall be provided. — The verb literally means to see, or, to see to a thing, and the sense of the proverb plainly is that in man’s necessity God will Himself see to it, and provide due help and deliverance. The Samaritan, Syriac and Vulg. have a better reading, namely, “In the mount Jehovah will provide.” This makes no change in the consonants, which alone are authoritative, but only in the vowels, which were added since the Christian era, and represent the tradition of the Jewish school of Tiberias. The LXX., without changing the vowels, translate, “In the mount Jehovah shall be seen,” which would be a prophecy of the manifestation of Christ. The other two renderings, besides their general proverbial sense, point onward to the providing upon this very spot of the sacrifice that was to take away the sins of the world (comp. Isaiah 53:5).
But when and how did this grow into a proverb? and who added this note? It may have been inserted by Moses when he arranged these marvellous. documents; less probably by Ezra and the men of the Great Synagogue, when they collected and revised the several books of Holy Scripture after the exile. In either case, the proverb is a national testimony to the genuineness of the record, and proves that the facts narrated in it were so impressed upon the memory of Abraham’s descendants, as to shape their thoughts and language.